Elaine Classen
In 1967, Classen completed a ceramic program through the Faculty of Extension at the University of Alberta. She worked for 20 years as a functional and sculptural potter and taught classes in her home studio. Although she found pottery rewarding, Classen returned to the University of Alberta when her children were grown to study painting, explore new ways to express herself artistically, and escape the restrictions of being a craftsperson. She earned a BFA in 1987, at the age of 57. Her large format landscape-inspired abstracts employ rectangles as vehicles of colour and sometimes reveal a combination of paint and clay, which gives texture to the canvasses. Although she has not prioritized the marketing or sale of her works, Classen has exhibited regularly in Edmonton and around Alberta. She hangs work gallery style in every room of her Edmonton home—including the bathroom—to suggest that, as long as they are beloved, one can never own too many paintings.